I’ve written before about how winning a lot of small victories paves the way for winning big victories later on. However, finding the motivation to continue through challenging times can be hard even with small tasks. Something I’ve found helpful for pressing on through the difficult parts is celebrating each victory as I win them.
When I’m learning something new, I often go through phases where I don’t notice any improvement. Sometimes I even appear to get worse for a while. What helps me get through those times is to remember the progress that I’ve made and think about how I’ve gotten through many of these phases in several areas. This works even better if I’ve been noting and celebrating my progress along the way, even if the improvement is minuscule.
I’ve also found it useful to take more of a systems approach instead of a goals approach, an idea I got from Scott Adams’s book How to Fail at Almost Everything and Still Win Big. A goals approach usually has a definite deadline or end point, expectation of rapid progress, pressure to improve, and frustration at missing the deadline or not improving at a certain rate. In contrast, a systems approach simply involves regularly working at something for an indefinite amount of time and not being overly focused on improvement or regression.
For example, the system I use for learning how to ride a unicycle looks like this: “I’m going to spend a bit of time each day practicing with my unicycle and having fun.” I don’t have a set amount of time that I practice each day, I take breaks whenever I feel like it, and I don’t get distraught if I appear to be stalling or even regressing. When I get a good ride, I smile and do a little dance; that serves as a celebration of my progress, a way to relax me (which also helps me do better), and a reminder to have fun and not take it too seriously. As a result, I’ve practiced every day since I got the unicycle and have seen fairly rapid progress while having fun along the way. And I know that I’ll eventually get the hang of it as long as I continue using this system.
This relates to something that Charles Duhigg talks about in The Power of Habit. He says that when trying to develop a new habit, giving yourself a reward (such as having a smoothie after getting back from the gym) increases your chances of sticking with the new behavior long enough for it to become permanent. I think celebrating my victories has been the reward I needed to continue even when there’s not much to celebrate. This is a simple but effective life hack and I’m glad I can use it whenever I like.